Inside the AP: Fear, determination

Reporters across The Associated Press are outraged over the Justice Department’s sweeping seizure of staff phone records — and they say such an intrusion could chill their relationships with confidential sources.

In conversations with POLITICO on Tuesday, several AP staffers in Washington, D.C., described feelings of anger and frustration with the DOJ and with the Obama administration in general.

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“People are pretty mad — mad that government has not taken what we do seriously,” one reporter said on Tuesday. “When the news broke yesterday … people were outraged and disgusted. No one was yelling and screaming, but it was like, ‘Are you kidding me!?’”

“People are ticked,” said another. “Everyone supports the reporters involved.”

The behind-the-scenes anger — and heads-down determination of the AP staff members to keep doing their jobs amid the extraordinary public flap — comes as top executives from the wire service have mounted an aggressive public pushback against DOJ, calling its snooping a “massive and unprecedented intrusion” in a letter fired off to Attorney General Eric Holder. And yet something of a bunkerlike atmosphere has taken hold at the AP in Washington with no bureau-wide meetings or announcements about the DOJ’s action, AP sources told POLITICO.

The AP employees interviewed by POLITICO did not want to be identified because, according to several sources, at least some journalists have been asked not to speak to the news media.

Early Tuesday afternoon, an individual at the AP Washington bureau who identified himself as the facilities manager told POLITICO to stop questioning reporters outside the office and address questions to corporate communications. “You have to understand our position,” he said. “We have to have a clear and consistent message.”

The chief concern about the government probe, according to many of those journalists, is that the DOJ’s intrusion will compromise their relationships with confidential sources, some of whom now fear that their private correspondence could be obtained by the federal government.

“We all know that confidential sourcing is the lifeblood of what we do, and people can’t come to us if they think they’re going to be compromised,” one reporter said. “It’s hard enough getting sources, now we’re afraid this is going to have a chilling effect.”